Reclamation Blues: The Lingering Legacy Of Fossil Fuels

ByIE Staff And Partners |November 16, 2015

There are one million acres of land across this country “disturbed” by coal mining. Since the 1950s we’ve drilled more than two and half million oil and gas wells. All of this is testimony to our deep energy appetites, but these mines and wells – eventually – need to be cleaned up. Coal mines must be reclaimed and restored to their original ecosystems. Gas and oil wells must be plugged to avoid leaks and environmental damage in the future. Inside Energy is investigating the systems and regulations put in place to clean up mines and wells.

For weeks this spring, students and teachers at the school in tiny Midwest, Wyoming reported strange smells and headaches. Then, in May, the school shut down after health officials detected dangerous levels of potentially toxic gases. But for months, no one could answer the questions: What were the gases? And how did they get into the school?

As coal companies go bankrupt there is growing concern and uncertainty over who will pay to clean up those mines. But Texas has been there before. In 2014, the state’s largest coal company filed for bankruptcy with over $1 billion in outstanding cleanup costs. Now, more than two years later, this case is held up an example of what works.

The search is continuing for the source of a gas leak that shut down the school in Midwest, Wyoming at the end of May. An Inside Energy analysis of the state oil and gas database shows there are more than 700 active and abandoned wells in a one mile radius around the Midwest school.

In many parts of the West, areas that are now houses and schools and shopping centers were once oil and gas fields. There’s little in the way of a visible legacy, but hidden underground, there are hundreds of thousands of abandoned wells. An Inside Energy investigation has discovered that in many communities, new development is happening on top of those old wells.

After Colorado’s devastating Gold King Mine spill, federal lawmakers have launched a series of initiatives to clean up mine pollution around the country. They’re looking for guidance from one state with loads of experience cleaning up dirty mines—Pennsylvania.

As the market for coal dwindles, who will foot the bill for restoring the land mined for coal to what it once was? Leigh Paterson reports for Inside Energy on the fate of billions of dollars in outstanding coal mine clean-up costs.